How to be inspired...

Today I just don't feel like working out.  I know this is exactly when I should be up and out there, but not today.  I needed to pay bills, I got up late and I have to be to work early again today.  My foot is hurting from the cortisone shots and I plan on going to the gym on my dinner break again.  I will not be going out tonight, as I get off early and I'm going to the gym again after I get off work so I can make up for some of this lost time.  Also, one way or another, I am swimming this weekend.  I have a 12 week swim plan that I need to start sticking to so I can start making some progress.

Meal 1:  
Grapes, a peach, 4 egg whites, coffee

Really feeling the workouts today.  I'm loving it!  However I won't be able to do any day workouts since I have a Dr. appt. at 11 to check on the broken foot.  However I will be hitting the gym again this eveing to work back & biceps.

Meal 1:
a peach and a bunch of red grapes, coffee

Went to get my foot re-x-rayed.  Still broken of course.  Got another cortisone shot in the other foot.  Hopefully I can start riding my bike again by Nov. and running again by Dec.   My running is definitely going to be my weakest point in triathlon until all of these stupid feet issues are finally over with.  But I'm going to train smart and steady and never give up.

Meal 2:
Amy's organic whole wheat burrito, Amy organ vegetable barely soup, a sm. handful of these cheesy cracker things, and 4 soda crackers w/ the soup.  Snack size snicker bar & more coffee, diet white tea.

I definitley need to do something to stave off these sweet/crunchy/salty muchies I'm getting.  I'm thinking lots of pickles & grapes, yogurt & cottage cheese, cans of tuna, things along that line.  Something to keep my mind off snacky foods.  I've been pretty good about the drinking so far.  No strong temptations.  I'm going to continue to hold fast to my goals and always keep in mind how shitty I feel after I drink.

Meal 3:
Apple, walnuts, grapes, Kashi honey/flax granola bar

Gym: Back & Biceps
Lat Pulldown: #70x10, 80#4x10
Cable Rows: #70 5x10
Overhead Lat row: 90# 5x10
Seated DB curls: #15 3x10
Standing BB curls: 35# 3x10
Machine curls: 25# 3x10
Cable curls: 30# 3x12

Meal 4:
whole balsamic roasted eggplant, chicken, 4 snack size hershey bars w/ coffee

At home: 1 wine cooler and 1/2 glass of home made maple mead.  I wasn't happy about this, but at least I restrained myself from eating.  

I'm loving the DOMS today it means I'm finally starting to push myself the way I need to.  When ever I don't feel like doing something is exactly the time I need to psych myself up and just do it.  Like today for example:  I made every excuse in the book not to go swimming today.  Well, I've just changed into my suit and I'll be heading out the door to the pool shortly.  This week especially is going to be a week of all kinds of temptations to drink and be lazy and grumpy.  Well, I'm not going to let that happen to me this time.  I need to break this rut/cycle I've already fallen so quickly into.

Up at 9:45am

Had a nectarine and some coffee and will be heading to the pool.

30min swim workout
200m swim
200m pulls
6x100m swim alt with/without hand fins (the fins work the arms and shoulders harder than without)
Total: 1000m

Meal 1:
Amy's organic whole wheat black bean burrito, 3 egg whites, 1 whole egg

Went to work early today

Meal 2:
PB&J made w/whole sprouted grain bread, natural peanutbutter & sugar free blueberry jelly, an apple

Meal 3:
fat free plain yogurt mixed withraspberries & whey protein

Gym workout: shoulder & abs
Robe Ab pulls - 20# 4x30
Hanging leg raises - 3x8 (these hurt my forearms)
Oblique crunch - 10# 4x12
Lower back ext. - 25#4x10
Seated DB military press - 20# 4x10
DB lateral raises - 10# 3x15
DB front raises - 15# 3x10
BB trap pull ups - 45# 3x10

Meal 4:
chicken, broccoli, sweet potato

I was jonesing for "snacky" foods later on and I had a Snickers bar and then when I came home I had 3 hard pretzles w/ mustard.  No it's not good for me, but I figured I could spare the calories.  Next time I need to bring more "fun" food to work so I don't get the snackies.

BLLLAAAAHHHH...shit weekend....don't even want to talk about it.  I got one halfway descen workout in, but still feel like shit.  I ate too much I drank too much and once again I feel like a slug!  When am I ever going to stop sabotaging myself the way I do??!!  I think I need to start taking antidepressants or something.  I'm tired of have these constant ups and downs.  I am so inconsistent.  I wish I had the mental discipline I had 6 years ago.  My stupid broken foot is really, really messing with my mind.  I hate not being able to do any sort of cardio but swimming.  I feel useless.  I can't wait to get back to training for triathlons.  I need to get my head back into the game and not let other people pull me down and stagnate me so much.  I love Grant to pieces, but I'm letting him "influence" me too much.  I'm the one the needs to step up and take the lead.  If I don't do that, then I'll just sucked into a vortex of inertia that I'll never be able to find my way out of!

So today: 
Up at 8am...not to bad considering I didn't get to sleep until nearly 2am.  Feel pretty good and awake right now at least.  
1 bottle of water, CLA, L-Carnitine, coffee

Abs - 4x25 raised legged floor crunches
           5x10 leg raises
          Total: 150 (yes Sarah, those are 150 sit ups!)  LOL :)

Meal 1: 4 egg whites, 1 nectarine, coffee, kudzu, milk thistle, g/c, chitosan
             
Pre-workout: 2 scoops of N.O. Explode  

Off to the gym to lift and then to the pool for a workout...

Gym: Legs & Abs
Leg Ext: 10# each leg - 5x15
Leg Curls 40# 5x15
Stiff leg dead lift - 65# 4x15
Reg. dead lift - 65# 4x15
Machine Ab 1/2 crunch - 50# 4x25
Outer thigh press - 70# 4x25
Inner thigh press - 80# 4x25
Rope ab pulls - #20 4x15

40min swim workout
200m swim
200m pulls
2x400m swim
Total 1200m

Meal 2: Organic Black bean soup w/ added brown rice, black beans & corn, diet white tea, chitosan, 2 Atro-Phex, L-Glut, G/C

I feel like I'm getting tired and I feel a bit grumpy.  Don't know why, am getting sick of feeling this way all the time. 

OK, I felt a lot better going into work and at work.  

Meal 3: celery & hummus, apple, plain fat free yogurt mixed w/ whey protein & raspberries

Gym workout: chest & triceps
Incline press - 65# 4x10
Bench press - 65#x10, 70# 2x10, 80#x11
Seated dips - 90# 4x10
Cable flys - #40x10, #30 3x10 (lost form and needed to go lighter)
Rope tricep pulls - #40 4x10
Machine triceps - #15 4x10

Meal 4: chicken, spinach salad (spinach, tomato, green onion, cucumber, garbanzo beans, raw pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds) sesame/lime dressing, grapes, pumpkin/flaxseed Kashi granola bar.

The day finished off better than I thought it would.  I was pretty tempeted to eat cheese when I came home from work, but I did not and feel a lot better for it!

It is exactly the kind of weakness and impulsive behavior I had last night that has kept me from loosing the weight and getting back to the "old me" of 6 years ago.  I have let my back surgery and the shit I went through in Philly completely ruin my will power.  I cannot keep lettin this happen any more.  I have an even bigger challenge to face coming up this weekend with Grant...and every weekend for that matter.  He is impulsive and not necessarily the best influence on me.  He always want to eat out or order in crap and he loves to sit around and watch tv.  I don't want us to continue in this downward spiral we're headed in anymore.  Even he's complaining about his weight.  I want us to go to the gym on Saturday and go swimming.  It sucks that I am limited to only swimming now because I want us to get back to running again, but it;s going to be a long time before I can run with him again.  It also sucks that neither of us has enough money to be able to buy any healthy food at the store this weekend.  Maybe I can convince him to come over here and eat this weekend...

At any rate, I'm going to stick to my guns this weekend and not give into the temptation to drink or eat any crap.  I want to loose 30lbs by Jan. 1, 2008.  That is my goal and I will attain it!

I was up 'till 3am last night and woke up at 8:30am.  Now I'm tired and feel like shit (my own stupid fault!)  I think I'm going to just lay back down and try to go back to sleep.  I need to recover and give myself some solid footing to start back over on.

Breakfast
Glass of V-8 juice, 2 veggie burgers, banana, coffee

I'm going to try to go back to sleep now...

Up at 9:30am...thanks to the cat rattling the large, plastic vertical blinds I have on the giant window in my room.  She was apparently bored and hungry this morning and just wanted me to know....

Have to be into work early today, so no workouts this afternoon. Will be doing a gym lifting session at dinner this evening. 

Breakfast
water, coffee, CLA, L-Carnitine, 2 slices of Ezekiel sprouted grain bread w/ natural peanut butter, handful of purple grapes.

Lunch
Organic Whole weat black bean burrito, coffee, grapes, peach, gluc./chon., calcium, chitosan, Atro-phex

Snack
Apple, raw walnuts

Pre-Gym meal
Brown rice, black beans & corn, celery & hummus

Gym - Back Biceps
Lat. pulldowns - 60# 5x15
Cable Rows - 60# 5x15
Front Lat. Pulldowns - 60# 5x15
Incline DB curls - 10#4x15
Machine Curls - 30# 4x10
Cable curls - 40# 3x12

Dinner
6" turkey sub from Subway

Then I came home from work early blew my entire day by drinking an entire 6 pack, 2 glasses of wine and eating a bunch of crap!  I was fully aware that I wanted to do that as I headed home and once again I feel like shit and regret doing that.

Feeling a lot better today.  Since I can't workout on my elliptical trainer first thing in the morning, I'm going ahead and eating breakfast first in the morning so that it will have a good hour and a half to digest before I hit the pool.  Besides, I'm hungry from only having a salad for dinner at 8:30 last night.  It's been over 12 hours since I've eaten.  Looking forward to getting back to swimming.  Fortunately all the kids are back in school, so I won't have to worry about being bothered by those little roaches while I'm trying to swim.

This is my settling in week, so nothing long or exhausting, I just want to get moving and create some momentum to start drawing from.  I need to do some stretching and ab work at home and plan on going to the gym to lift again tonight depending on what Grant wants to do.  He may not want to since I have 8 o'clock dinner tonight.  If that's the case, I'll go and do shoulders and more abs.

Was up at 8:45 and took my CLA & L-Carnitine w/ a bottle of water.
9:30am Meal 1
Kashi puffed grain cereal sweetened w/ stevia, skim milk, raspberries, a banana, coffee, Supplaments include: Kudzu, milk thistle, Gluc./Chon., chitosan

Feeling full, need to go stretch for a while and get the blood flowing....

10:00am Stretching & abs
Full body/Yoga style stretching
Ab floor crunches w/ legs crossed - 4x50
Bicycles - 4x25
Oblique floor crunches - 2x25 each side

10:30am
Essential Greens & 2 Atro-Phex

Feeling more awake and ready for a swim...

Had a great swim workout from 10:45-11:30
200m warmup
50m kicks (couldn't wear the fins because of the broken foot, so the kicks became pretty useless after 50m.  I won't be able to do those again until I can wear the fins)
200m pulls
4x200m swim alt. each set w/ hand fins
Total meters: 1250

12:00pm back home and starving Meal 2
bowl of brown rice, black beans & corn, 1ltr of lime seltzer water, chitosan & gluc./chon, glass of lite chocolate soy milk
(too much hot sauce on the rice & beans tho...my mouth is on fire!)

1:00pm 
More coffee leftover from this morning (up to 2 cups so far today), calcium, aminos

2:30pm pre work snack
1/2 c. coffee lg. nectarine, handful grapes

off to work

4:00pm Meal 3
2 carrots & hummus, mint/terregon tea sweatened w/ stevia

6:40pm Meal 4 early because I was starving
baked sweet potato w/ hummus & Butter Buds, spinach salad w/ cucumber, green onion, yellow pepper, tomato, raw pumpkin seeds, raw sunflower seeds, garbanzo beans, sesame/lime dressing.

12:30am hungry again after work and stomach was bothering me...
3 Wasa crisps w/ natural peanut butter, choc. soy milk (lite of course)

Asleep by 1am

I was still recovering from Monday, so I didn't exactly feel up to par at all on Tuesday.  Not a lot of energy and my stomach felt aweful all day.  But I decided to go ahead and start recording all my food and my workouts in an effort to start getting my on the right track to reach my goals.  Amazingly enough, I felt descent enough to go to the gym for an abbreviated leg workout.  My main goal this week and next week is to just get my body moving consistently again and to start incorporating more stretching into everyday.  Food-wise, I want to stay on track during the week with the vegitarian stuff.  I'll allow myself to indulge a bit over the weekend, but no drinking!

9:30am Meal 1
3 Wasa crisps w/ natural peanut butter, a peach, coffee, a glass of choc. soy milk, glucosamine/chondroitin (for my joints), milk thistle, kudzu

11:30am Meal 2
V-8 juice, Amy's organic whole wheat burrito

2:00pm craving salty/crunchy foods
several baby dill pickles, camomile tea to settle my stomach

At work at 3pm

3:30pm Meal 3
2 am apples, raw walnuts, black tea

6:35 pre gym Meal 4
3 celery sticks w/ hummus

7:15pm dinner break,  gym workout - Legs & stretching
Leg Ext. -  20# each leg, 5x10
Leg Curls - 50# 5x10
Inner Thigh - 80# 3x25
Outer Thigh - 70# 3x20
Lots of stretching in between

8:30pm Meal 5
Stomach was still bothering me so all could eat was my big salad
Spinach salad w/ tomato, onion, cucumber, raw pupmkin seeds, raw sunflower seeds, parsely & Tahini Sesame Lime dressing

9:00pm 
Kava tea sweetened w/ stevia

Stomach still felt like I was trying to digest a rock.  Was in bed and asleep by 12:30am.

I'm glad I was able to get to the gym.  I knew if I could at least get there and start moving again I would at least feel like I was moving in the right direction again.  Overall, I feel pretty happy with my eating and being able to lift today even though it was light.  I'm not going to be able to work legs the way I want to until my foot heals, so I'll have to make the best out of what I can do with them.

Yesterday was sick all day and am still feeling like ass today.  No evergy, no strength, trying to eat healthy and am starting to journal all my meals and workouts so I can start keeping track of my progress

Aug. 21th, Tuesday
Weight: 170lbs
Feeling tired and upset stomach, feel weak with no energy.
Not sure if I'll workout this eveing...probably not.

Dealing with broken foot for the next 6 weeks so my workouts will be limited to abs/stretching, weightlifting with limits on leg workout, swimming.  I have a good 12 week 3x a week swim workout that I plan on doubling up on for the next 6 weeks and adding in some kayaking once or twice a week until my foot heals. 

I want to loose weight and get into triathlon training again so that I can actually do my first triathlon next year.  I currently have a broken foot, so I'm reduced to swimming, weightlifting and stretching.  

My Fitness Goals: 
*Swim 2000m non-stop and increase my swim speed at my current level
*Get back to biking and running once my foot heals with a goal of riding 20mi. every other day and running a min 5k 5 days a week.
*Focus on lower weights higher reps of lifting with and emphasis on functional lifting: more pull ups, chin ups & dips.  
*Abdominal work and stretching every day.
*Start doing yoga classes and Spinning classes at least once a week (depending on schedule)
*Keep a constant fitness and nutrition journal so that I can stay on track with everything for once in my life!!
*Goal weight: 130lbs
*Triathlon goal: 1st Triathlon March of '08 with a goal of 3-4 sprint Triathlons througout the year
*Do as many 5-10K runs as I can find in the area
*Do more kayaking (at least once a week)
*Do as much cardio as I can everyday with a focus on endurance

My Nutrition Goals:
*Cut out alcohol, sugar & white flour
*Focus on mostly raw, vegan diet 70% of the time
*Majority of my animal protein will come from fish, egg whites, yogurt, whey protein
*Allow myself to indulge once a week to keep my sanity
*Eat more soy, beans, nuts & seeds (raw)
*Eat more sproutes
*Focus on vegitarian proteins more
*Eat fresh raw produce daily with lot of greens, crucifierous vegies, fruits
*No food after 7pm during the weekday, last meal will be whey protein mixed with plain yogurt after a gym workout
*Eat more soups, veggie stews & veggie chili
*Buy a juicer and start juicing everyday to get a many greens as I can
*

I need to start holding myself accountable for what I eat and how much I work out. I want to be more disciplined and focused on my goals.  Along with my fitness and  nutrition goals I also want to start focusing on a few more goals I plan to accomplish in the next 1-5 years:

*Get out of debt once and for all
*Get a 401K and a savings acct. started
*Write my novel with a goal of turning it into a series
*Learn foreign languages based on where I want to travel, starting with Spanish
*Start reading more with a goal of actually reading all my books
*Make a point of improving my mind everyday with studying or trying something that makes me focus and think
*Learn how to be absorbed in the moment

These are just a few of my goals and desires.  These will be added upon and altered as needed, but the base goals will remain the same.  I will loose the weight and I will start doing triathlons next year.